Critics Praise TV Coverage of Terror in Us, Warn of Rising Jingoism

Critics Praise TV Coverage of Terror in US, Warn of Rising Jingoism

by Robert Holloway
Agence France Presse
September 18, 2001

NEW YORK - Critics praised US television networks Monday for their initial coverage of last week's attacks on New York and Washington, but said a dangerous note of jingoism had crept in since President George W. Bush declared war on terrorism.

They said unabashed displays of patriotic colors by journalists, and drumbeat reporting of Washington's increasingly militant posturing, posed problems for a trade that professes to be based on neutrality and objectivity.

"The distance between the media and the government is becoming blurred and we have to keep a watch on that," said Caryn James, chief television critic of the New York Times.

James said uninterrupted coverage by all news networks since last Tuesday of the destruction of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, followed by the search for survivors, was "completely unprecedented".

The only comparable event in US broadcasting history was the four days devoted entirely to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963.

"Last week, some channels, like the food channel, simply stopped broadcasting and said turn to your news channel," she said.

"ESPN channel broadcast ABC news instead of sports. That had never happened before. Now it is getting back to normal and we are starting to have soap operas again."

Mark Crispin Miller, professor of media studies at New York University, agreed with James that the first two days were "generally exemplary".

"The television news people were focused primarily on giving us as much information as they could, without ever engaging in or encouraging reckless speculation about the identity of the perpetrators," he said.

Crispin Miller said the media seemed to have learned from its embarrassment after hastily pinning the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing on Arab terrorists when in fact it was the work of a US extremist, Timothy McVeigh, who was executed on June 11.

The Washington Post's chief media reporter, Howard Kurtz, said networks had been cautious, although mistakes were made.

"In the chaos and confusion, most of the major networks managed to trumpet false rumours such as the carbomb at the State Department and the 'miraculous' recovery of five people at the World Trade Center two days later," he recalled.

Even so, James noted, the news anchors did not panic. "The towers had been hit. We were seeing them burn, and then the Pentagon was hit and no-one knew where that was going," she said. "It was very reassuring for Americans to know what was going on, horrifying as it was to watch."

James noted that soon after two hijacked airliners hit the towers, the networks agreed to share exclusive footage.

"That set the tone, that this was a national emergency that had to be covered seriously, cautiously," she said.

Kurtz said the networks deserved credit for forgoing an estimated 100 million dollars in advertising revenue when they went over to uninterrupted coverage.

But, he said, "television turned some viewers off by relentlessly replaying footage of planes hitting the World Trade Center or using it as video wallpaper while interviewing people."

Crispin Miller said this was part of television's "tendency to aestheticise the tragedy with slow-motion footage, dramatic music and solemn titles such as 'America Rising,' which turned later coverage into a 24-hour-a-day disaster flick."

More serious, he said, was "the utter failure ever to ask the basic question why did this happen or in any other way to give crucial background."

One piece of film, broadcast repeatedly by some networks, showed Palestinians celebrating the news that the twin towers had been destroyed and the Pentagon military complex set ablaze.

The scene was filmed during the funeral of nine people killed the previous day in an Israeli attack, Crispin Miller said, and "to show it without explaining the background, and to show it over and over again, is to make propaganda for the war machine and is irresponsible."

All three critics said they were disturbed by reporters and news anchors apparently responding positively to Bush's appeal to the patriotism of US citizens.

"To see Tim Russert (NBC anchorman) interviewing the vice-president (Dick Cheney) wearing a red, white and blue ribbon, is totally unprecedented," James said.

"It is important that journalists do not become flag-wavers in this crisis or cheer-leaders for Team USA," Kurtz said.

Crispin Miller said the wave of jingoism "makes Bush's characterization of the war credible to audiences, that this is a struggle between good and evil."

"That is exactly how Osama bin Laden sees the world," he said, referring to the Saudi radical named by Bush as prime suspect in last week's terrorist strikes.

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